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Judge: Nathan Dunlap to face execution on week of Aug. 18

Nathan Dunlap arrives at Arapahoe County Court in Centennial on May 1, 2013. (Helen H. Richardson, The Denver Post)

A judge Wednesday set the week of Aug. 18 as the time Nathan Dunlap should die for killing three teenage employees and their 50-year-old manager during the robbery of a Chuck E. Cheese's restaurant in Aurora nearly 20 years ago.

Over the objections of Dunlap's attorneys, Judge William Sylvester announced the date in an Arapahoe County District Court.

One hand cuffed to his waist and the other free to take notes, Dunlap sat before Sylvester. Dunlap wore a blue shirt and tie, glasses with thick black frames and his trademark dreadlocks hanging down his back.

Dunlap smiled when he walked into the courtroom, and he occasionally rocked in his chair. He stood once while officers adjusted his handcuffs. He did not speak during about 90 minutes in court.

Photos: Nathan Dunlap Execution Date Set

Sylvester established the one-week window for the execution but did not set the actual date. That task lies with the director of the Department of Corrections.

Wednesday marked the first time a death date has been set in Colorado since the October 1997 execution of killer Gary Davis.

Families of the victims hugged one another as they left the crowded courtroom Wednesday. Bob and Marj Crowell — parents of Sylvia Crowell, who was 19 when Dunlap shot her to death — said the execution date brings them "one step closer" to justice for their daughter.

Nancy Grant, whose son Ben Grant also died in the restaurant, said there is still a long way to go before her child gets justice.

"It needed to be done, and I hope the governor agrees," she said.

Dunlap's attorneys, meanwhile, are hoping to persuade Gov. John Hickenlooper to do the opposite.

Attorney Philip Cherner said a request to the governor for clemency — and to commute Dunlap's sentence to life without parole — would be his next order of business.

Cherner also said he plans to file motions contending that Colorado's death penalty constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.

"We will not stop trying to save Mr. Dunlap's life," he said.

Sylvester set a June 10 hearing date for those motions.

However, Arapahoe District Attorney George Brauchler said the chances of Dunlap dying in August are "100 percent, unless the governor intervenes."

Jim Peters, former District Attorney in Jefferson County and a member of the team who prosecuted Dunlap, said if anyone deserves the death penalty, it is Dunlap.

Peters emotionally described Dunlap lying in wait until the restaurant, where he once worked, closed — and then he "came out shooting."

Dunlap has never shown remorse, Peters said. "He bragged that it felt better than having sex to kill them."

A shackled Nathan Dunlap is led into court Wednesday afternoon. (Helen H. Richardson, The Denver Post)

A number of issues remain to be resolved in the case, including an appeal by Dunlap's attorneys to unseal the secret Department of Corrections document that describes how an execution will be carried out.

A state appeals court has already ruled against Dunlap in that case.

When Hickenlooper ran for governor in 2010, The Denver Post asked him whether the death penalty should be repealed. "No, but it should be restricted," he said.

Late last year, though, Hickenlooper was less decisive.

"I wrestle with this, right now, on a pretty much daily basis because we are in a position where we have a couple of death-row inmates that are going to come up," Hickenlooper told The Associated Press, "and I haven't come to a conclusion."

Earlier in the current legislative session, rumors that Hickenlooper might veto a bill repealing the death penalty derailed the measure.

Asked Wednesday whether the governor has reached a conclusion about his death penalty position, a spokesman said: "He has not."

Another — and potentially critical — issue stands between Dunlap and his last meal.

Like states around the country, Colorado is in a bit of a quandary over how it will obtain the three drugs to be used in an execution.

One of those drugs, sodium thiopental, is no longer manufactured in the United States, and the Italian government has said it will not allow the drug to be exported from a plant there if it is to be used for carrying out executions.

The DOC has sent letters to numerous compounding pharmacies around the state, seeking help getting the drug, spokeswoman Adrienne Jacobson confirmed.

But the department has refused requests, by both The Post and Dunlap's attorneys, to disclose whether any of those pharmacies have agreed to compound the drug for the state.

What's next

Clemency appeal: Nathan Dunlap can ask Gov. John Hickenlooper to commute the death sentence.

May 23: Deadline to file promised motions challenging state death penalty statute.

June 10: Hearings on those motions.

Pending: Petition to the Colorado Supreme Court to review a lower-court decision upholding the Department of Corrections procedure for carrying out an execution.

Week of Aug. 18: Scheduled execution. The exact date will be set by the director of the DOC. Dunlap would be transferred to the Colorado State Penitentiary in Cañon City and segregated in a separate holding cell in the execution suite.

This article has been corrected in this online archive. Originally, due to an editor's error, the informational box that accompanied the story incorrectly stated the options available to the governor. A pardon can be granted only after a prison sentence has been served.

Nathan Dunlap, siting next to one of his lawyers, Philip Cherner, left and Madeline Cohen, in blue, behind Dunlap, listens to the proceedings in Arapahoe County Court in Centennia on May 1, 2013. (Helen H. Richardson, The Denver Post)

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